Japan, Day 8

Saturday, November 18, 2006

We had to wake up really early because everyone wanted to get to see as much of the museum as possible. Dad and I met up with Auntie Lorraine and Uncle Lionel for breakfast in the hotel downstairs. The breakfast was pretty huge; we had an American-style meal of eggs, toast, and sausage with orange juice and coffee to drink.

Then, we met up with Tiffany and her friend Kim to walk over to the A-Bomb Museum. Before we went to the actual museum, we went to look at the "A-Bomb Dome." The Dome was almost directly under the bomb when it was dropped on Hiroshima. Since the atom bomb exploded in the air over the city and then spread outwards, the building that was directly below it somehow managed to not be completely decimated. It's been restored since the bombing, but the structure shown here is what was left immediately after the bomb dropped.

Next, we headed over to the museum. The admission was something like 100 yen (about a dollar), I think because they want to encourage as many people as possible to go see the museum. It's split into two parts with an elevated walkway connecting the wings. The wing seen on the left side has the museum entrance. There is an entirely new area there that was donated by the Clinton administration. It has information on the Japanese history leading up to World War II, the build-up to dropping the atom bomb, and the reasons for dropping it.

The wing on the right side contains Japanese artifacts and dioramas showing the effects of the bombing and the aftermath. That side has a lot more of the really gruesome photos, bloodstained clothing, but also the heartbreaking stories of individuals who had initially survived the bombing (only to die a few days or even hours later).

Uncle Lionel had arranged for us to have a private tour of the museum and the grounds, so we were originally shown around by two volunteers, a man and a woman. The woman showed us around the museum itself, and then we were taken to the Peace Park outside with the male tour guide.

It had been said by the Japanese that nothing would grow in Hiroshima for something like 75 years after the bombing due to the toxicity of the area. Plants began growing much much sooner. This tree in the Hiroshima Peace Park was thought to be dead after the bombing, but somehow continued to grow. You can see the indent in its trunk where it almost seems to be protecting its scars and attempting to grow over the damaged areas.

This is another memorial from the Peace Park, which is a beautiful park stretching across the front of the Museum. Different memorials, each dedicated to various groups that perished in the bombing, are scattered around the area and surrounded by beautiful plants, trees, fountains, and rocks.

My favorite memorial was this one:

It's dedicated to the children that perished in the bombing. One girl who suffered what eventually became fatal injuries decided to fold 1,000 paper cranes for good luck--both for her and all the others in Hiroshima. Even though she folded over 1,000 cranes, she died shortly after.

Because of her, there are tons of little shelters that hold tens of thousands of paper cranes that are brought every day. You should be able to see the shelters standing behind the bell.

Up close, they are packed with cranes. One of them was open with barely enough room to fit a string of cranes, and there was a note on it that said that it had only been open for one day!

On our way back to the museum for a quick snack, we stopped at this memorial, which is right in front:

I believe that this one is generally dedicated to the city of Hiroshima. Behind the arch is a large reflection pool.

We then said goodbye to our other tour guide, and headed inside. We ate in the tiny cafe that they had at the museum. Nothing to write home about, they only had microwaveable stuff. I tried one of the maple cookies that seem to be all over the southern part of Japan. They look kind of like leaf-shaped mooncakes, but in fact are soft and spongy, and the one that I had was filled with a chocolate-y paste. It was okay; not something I'd crave. We had some time before our meeting with the Hiroshima survivor, so everyone wanted to get a closer look at the museum exhibits.

This photo is of a watch, stopped at exactly 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, when the bomb was dropped:

One of the new exhibits was a diorama showing what Hiroshima looked like before the bombing:

There was also a video playing, showing footage of Hiroshima beforehand. It was a happening city with a really big nightlife. After the bomb, everything was entirely floored:

This is a photo taken a few days afterwards:

The A-Bomb Dome looks pretty much the same as it does today...The bridges you see in the background are what we believe to have been the targets in the bombing.

Next to these photos and dioramas was text written by the Clinton Administration on why the bomb was dropped. Some of the most disturbing information was that the U.S. government wanted to drop the bomb on a city with a lot of civilians so that they could study the results scientifically and have a lot of subjects. In order to have a lot of victims, warning papers were not dropped over Hiroshima before the A-Bomb was dropped.

The next photos I have are of some very disturbing footage at the museum. I'm not posting too many since this is a food blog, so if you would like to see more, go to Uncle Lionel's postings):

This one has photos of all of their travels: http://www.teachingassistant.net/photos/asia2006/

This one includes photos from Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Uncle Lionel knows a lot more than I do so I'll let you read his commentary and I'll stick to food as much as I can: http://mindobserver.com/compassion/

I thought that this photo was one of the most powerful. It was taken just after the bombing. It's in black and white, so at first I wasn't too taken by it. But then I noticed a caption below that explained that all of the black on these people's clothing is actually blood. The photo does the rest of the talking:

As I said before, the opposite wing, the Japanese wing of the museum, had more graphic images and artifacts. As we crossed over from the left wing of the museum, I felt the air get distinctly cooler. The lights slowly got dimmer and I looked to my right:

This diorama portrays children after the bombing. I read the book Hiroshima by John Hersey in an English class at Cal, which described a scene somewhat like this. One of the survivors described seeing her clothes being completely burned off of her, hanging in shreds. She then realized that it was her skin hanging in shreds, having melted with the fabric.

The rest of the wing has photos of the victims and artifacts collected after the bombing, such as blood-stained clothing and journals. There was also a cement step from a building that had a shadow of a woman burned onto it because the rays from the bomb were so powerful.

Another area was dedicated to the aftermath of the bomb. Not only were people killed from the bomb itself, but those who came into Hiroshima immediately after the bombing to try and rescue family and friends were killed also. The "black rain" killed anyone who was exposed, and the drinking water was lethal.

Again, there are a lot more photos on Uncle Lionel's site, so I definitely recommend checking it out.

We walked around for quite a while, but then had to head down to the basement to meet with a Hiroshima survivor. She was twelve years old when the bomb was dropped. You can't really see from the photo, but she has had something like 7 corrective surgeries since. She talked with us for about an hour about her experiences. Much of the information she gave us was about the bombing in general. Then, she told us personally what it was like during the bombing and afterwards.

One thing that we don't tend to learn about is what it was like for the survivors many years after the bombing. The corrective surgeries weren't available until much later, so while growing up, she was shunned even by the Japanese. People refused to sit next to her on the subway, and she was unable to find a husband. She did end up raising her brother's children, but from the way that she spoke, there was clearly a great deal of pain associated with not being able to find a husband.

It was quite an amazing experience to hear her talk. There are not many people who get to meet an A-Bomb survivor, and as time goes on there will be fewer and fewer. One of her messages, and the message of the museum, is to spread the knowledge of the tragic outcome of nuclear war. She and other survivors attend meetings, write letters, and give talks so as to teach the younger generations. In addition, to help keep the memory alive, the museum has been collecting survivor artwork for years, and she has contributed:

The museum was a very powerful place to visit. It's easy to be hardened and non-responsive to the Hiroshima bombing by sitting in class and just reading about it, or seeing a picture in a textbook. But looking at these photos, the artifacts, and speaking to a survivor really changes that. I'm so grateful for what I experienced in Hiroshima, and I feel that everyone would benefit from visiting.

There isn't any graceful way of transitioning from the museum to food, so I'm just going to go for it. After a mental break, we headed out to go try the food of Hiroshima...Okonomiyake.

Our guy's stall was in a four story building in downtown Hiroshima. Each floor had about 8 stalls exactly like this one--how to tell the difference between them all I have no idea, but when we left, each stall was completely packed with customers. To make Okonomiyake, he starts out with a pancake.

It then gets covered with fresh cabbage and spices.

The one I ordered had squid, so on top of the cabbage, he cracked some deep fried squid on top. Next, come chinese noodles (he recommended these over Udon noodles), tonkatsu sauce, a fried egg, seaweed and green onions. This is the final product:

There are other things you can get in it as well, such as kimchee, other meats and seafood. It's pretty gigantic--they give you a pie cutter type thing so that you can cut it into fourths and eat it in pieces. I'm not the biggest fan of Okonomiyake, but I think it's definitely something that everyone has to try in southern Japan. For me, there are just too many flavors packed into one place. It is, however, very filling and somewhat healthy. If anything, it's fun to go just for the experience and entertainment of watching them make it.